


all the king's horses, all the king's men, and the nearly insurmountable complexity of putting things back together again

by ErraticIpseity



Series: all the king's horses, all the king's men, and the nearly insurmountable complexity of putting things back together again [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Gen, M/M, Missing Scene, Post-Episode 160, no longer canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-08-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:01:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22512154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ErraticIpseity/pseuds/ErraticIpseity
Summary: a collection of short fics on the subject of breaking (and mending)tags are not complete list of warnings, but content warnings are listed at the beginning of each chapter, please check there for safety!
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Series: all the king's horses, all the king's men, and the nearly insurmountable complexity of putting things back together again [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1748629
Comments: 50
Kudos: 302





	1. pull together

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [rotten luck](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21283694) by [Prim_the_Amazing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/pseuds/Prim_the_Amazing). 
  * Inspired by [broken doll](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21298511) by [screechfox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/screechfox/pseuds/screechfox). 



> All works that inspired chapters of this fic will be listed here, see individual chapter notes to link back to related works for each chapter :)
> 
> Also content warnings for each chapter will be listed at the beginning of that chapter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This first chapter is either a missing scene or slight AU set between ep 139 and 140

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Noted in the tags, but warnings for** : vomiting, referenced past self-harm, dissociation/derealization, eating issues, and poor mental state in general
> 
> I feel a bit guilty for writing angst for this fandom since the canon already has so much angst? I promise I’m working on some fluff right now, but this is not it.

When Jon cuts off the Beholding, he distantly hears a voice end the recording and sees a hand click the off button. He thinks it’s his own voice, his own hand, but “self” is rather difficult to determine right now. Jon’s body then decides it can no longer hold itself in the shape of a person. He’s aware of it tumbling from chair to floor. The corner of the desk is digging deeply into the meat attached to Jon’s arm bone, but he can’t feel it. The wash of pain in his mind is bigger than physical, bleeding out into the space beyond him in a bright white aura, growing to obscure everything else.

_He dreams of thousands of glittering eyes._

Then he wakes up. His body is shivering violently. Its eyes refuse to open, but somehow, he can still see too much. He doesn’t know where he is.

_He dreams of too many bones.  
_

Then he wakes up. He feels like someone has written hundreds, thousands of pages worth of information on a single sheet of paper and he’s reading it all and it hurts. He doesn’t know who he is.

_He dreams of suffocating darkness._

Then he wakes up. His head is too full of everything that he is not. He’s doesn’t know where everything that he is has been displaced to. He can’t quite remember how to breathe.

_He dreams of scorching fire._

Then he wakes up. It’s like the feeling when he wakes from a nightmare, boiling up under the blankets, and he desperately needs to shove them off (like doing so can get rid of the dream). But there are no blankets, so he simply lies still.

_He dreams of painful emptiness._

Then he wakes up. He groans, squinting at the familiar, dingy tiles of his office ceiling. The lights are still on, and their cold fluorescence burns his retinas. The back of his throat tastes like blood. His head hurts, though the pain has lessened to a level where he doesn’t feel on the verge of passing out again. His whole body aches as well, like he’s been lying on the floor for several hours. That must be what happened, though he can’t remember anything clearly. His recent memory consists only of waves of pain and otherness for an undefined period of time.

There is no point in wallowing. Attempting to see Lukas’ plans has failed, just one more failure to add to the list. He still has things to do. He shoves his stiff body into a sitting position, ignoring vehement protests from his shoulders and back. But he can’t ignore the dizzying wave of nausea that the change in altitude brings. He takes a deep breath through his nose, trying to steady himself, but the smell of blood and fear chokes him. He grabs for the only receptacle he can find (the recycling bin from under the desk) and retches into it.

Of course that’s when Basira walks in. She says nothing, waiting for him to recover enough to answer, he supposes.

The bin was hardly necessary. He hasn’t eaten food in…well. He’s not sure. Long enough that there’s nothing to bring up. If only he could vomit up statements. Plenty of those inside of him. But no. He spits acrid bile and nothing else onto old documents, shuddering.

When he’s sure _that’s_ over he sits back against the desk, breathing hard through his nose and scrubbing at his watering eyes. When he finally looks up at Basira, her expression says “I hoped for better but didn’t really expect it” louder than words could have.

_Sorry, Basira,_ he thinks bitterly. _This is all any of us get._

“You dying?” she asks.

He means to snap at her, “Not presently, but any day now.”

Unfortunately, his throat hasn’t recovered enough to speak, so he settles for coughing and shaking his head “no” as gingerly as possible.

“Good,” Basira says curtly, nodding once.

She crosses the room and crouches down to take the bin from his hands, then presses a clean handkerchief and a bottle of water into them instead. She clasps his shoulder briefly before standing. Her grip is strong, steadying, and when she lets go, he feels untethered. The brusque way she carries herself never changes, even as he twists into something piteous. He's glad of it, in a way. It helps reminds him of the emotional distance he should be keeping. Still, something in him clamors for comfort, for someone to care, and to brush his hair back, and to hold him. To offer him tea. He violently halts that line of thought, fiddles with the cloth in his hands.

“I’ll be back in ten minutes. Pull yourself together,” Basira says. Before he can gather the wherewithal to answer, she sweeps out of the room.

_Pull yourself together._

Her choice of words echoes in his skull. It’s almost funny. He thinks of hacking at his own fingers, of the rib in his desk, of the body that was decidedly not his own for the last several hours. The body that doesn’t really feel like his own even now. He’s spent so long tearing himself apart, he’ll certainly never be able to pull all the pieces back together again.

_Pull yourself together._

He chuckles to himself.

_Pull yourself together._

He full-on laughs, deep and jagged, far more than an edge of hysteria in the sound.

_Pull yourself together._

Once he’s started, he can’t stop. He laughs until tears pour down his face, until dark spots cloud his vision as he gasps for air around the violent bouts of mirth. The pain in his head flares so strongly he thinks he might pass out again. But he doesn’t, and by the time Basira returns, the fit is over, leaving him feeling incredibly empty. He’s put himself back in his chair, he’s rinsed his mouth, and his eyes are dry. He has pulled together all the pieces he can, and he is still full of holes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a continuing collection so keep an eye out (ha) for more  
> There are two more chapters I have mostly written and am currently wrangling into submission which will be up soon-ish
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed!  
> Come yell at me on tumblr @exhaustedtypewriter
> 
> Kudos, comments, and constructive criticism are all welcome and appreciated


	2. shatter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> what if we... desperately clung to each other... while crying on the bathroom floor of a safehouse in rural Scotland.. aha ha, just kidding.. unless..?  
> (this is me taking a very overdue shot at a post-160 scene)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was inspired by [rotten luck](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21283694) by Prim_the_Amazing and [broken doll](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21298511) by screechfox so go check those out, they're really wonderful takes on Jon as The Archive!
> 
>  **Warning for:** implied self-injury (to stop reading The Statement), suffering typical to ep 160
> 
> [Note 3rd March 2020: Minor edits made for grammar and because I somehow forgot Jon's magic healing powers. No changes that should have any effect on the story.]

Jon’s laughter makes the hairs on the back of Martin’s neck stand up. To him, the pure wrongness of the sound is more chilling than the world turning inside out.

“Jon?” he says shakily. “I think you should get away from the windows.”

“Why? It belongs out there, with its brethren,” Jon replies nonsensically, in that odd, reverent voice. Horrible laughter bubbles up between the words.

Shifting violet light from outside tints his face an unhealthy color and doesn’t glint off his wide eyes at all. Instead it looks like they are _absorbing_ , ravenous for everything that touches them. And still he laughs.

Martin doesn’t have an answer. His mouth has gone dry as dust. His body tells him to back away, run, _run_.

He doesn’t run.

“Come here,” he says, and he pulls Jon into a crushing hug. “Close your eyes.”

Jon struggles against him for a moment, but his body is weak from his ordeal, and he soon curls into the embrace, barely supporting his own weight. Martin hastily steadies himself and readjusts his grip, so they don’t both end up on the ground. They stay there for a moment, until Martin glances out the window and has the sickening impression that the sky is rolling.

He maneuvers them into the bathroom, the most sheltered place in the house. Something crunches underfoot. He looks down to see disjointed pieces of him and Jon looking back at him, grim and tear stained. It bewilders him for a moment until his brain catches up and he realizes it’s just the mirror. He shuffles some of the shards out of the way with his foot and sits Jon on the floor, balanced against the wall and the side of the tub. Now Jon is shielded from the skies, he’s gone quiet. He begins to turn his head to look out the door.

Martin closes it and locks it behind him. The bathroom is cramped and terribly dark. But the door has a lock, there are no windows, and there is a sturdy knife stashed in the medicine cabinet (courtesy of Daisy). All probably useless against whatever might come for them, but it makes him feel better, nonetheless. He’s not sure if the power is out, and it doesn’t matter because the lightbulbs are as broken as the windows and mirror. He gets out the torch he still carries everywhere and rests it on the side of the tub. It provides just enough light to see Jon’s lost expression. Martin sits on the side of the tub and takes his hand.

“Talk to me. Please, Jon,” he begs. “What happened? What do I do?”

Jon gives no indication that he hears the question.

“Right. Okay,” says Martin. He takes a breath, scrubs his hands down his face, considers screaming, decides against it, and carries on.

He starts by sweeping all the glass into one corner with a towel.

“Ow. Fuck.” Despite the towel he’s managed to slice his hand open.

 _Idiot,_ he berates himself.

He haphazardly wraps the wound in toilet paper, finishes sweeping, then gathers supplies for his next task. He doesn’t trust the tap, but there’s a jug of distilled water in the cupboard, as well as clean washcloths, antiseptic, and a basic first aid kit. He didn’t go full apocalypse prepper, but he did learn a few things after being trapped in his flat by worms so long ago.

Here, in the dark and quiet, wedged on the floor between toilet and tub, he tries to put Jon back in order. He straightens out Jon’s collar. He uses antiseptic to clean the nail marks on his throat and the flesh from under his nails. A trail of nearly dry blood leads from side of his mouth to his chin; he must have bitten his tongue. He uses water to wipe blood and tears from Jon’s face, mindful not to drip any in his empty, staring eyes. He disinfects the one larger cut over his eyebrow, though it's already nearly closed. He combs through Jon’s hair with the fingers of his good hand, calming the tangles, carefully picking out bits of broken glass. Jon doesn’t so much as flinch through all of his ministrations.

Once he’s out of things to do, the ache of abandonment flickers through him. He shoves it down. He didn’t wait long enough last time, in the hospital, and he suspects it led indirectly to all of this, whatever _this_ is. So, he’ll stay until Jon is himself again. He’ll wait as long as it takes. He leans Jon across his lap so his head rests in the crook of his arm and continues to gently stroke his hair.

The clock on his phone is going backwards and forwards at random intervals, so he doesn’t know how long they sit there. Sounds from outside filter in and he does his best not to imagine what they might be. He knows he should turn off the torch to preserve power, but he can’t bring himself to do it. Darkness feels more powerful than it did yesterday. At some point his hand starts bleeding though the toilet paper, so he replaces it with gauze.

Pressed close as they are, Martin knows the moment Jon’s demeanor changes. He can feel when his hands go from limp to clenched in the fabric of his jumper, when his breathing changes from shallow to shuddering. It sparks hope so warmly in his chest that it hurts.

“Jon?”

Jon flinches slightly at the question then shakes his head. He opens his mouth as if to answer, but panic flashes across his face when his lips begin to move, forming silent words. He turns to bury his face into Martin’s chest. He’s whispering something into the fabric, too quiet for Martin to hear. Martin leans closer and the warm hope dies when he realizes it’s a statement. Or pieces of statements. As Jon’s voice gains strength, the tone and pitch change every few sentences, as if many people are speaking from one tortured tongue. Some fragments Martin recognizes, some are new to him. Jon gasps irregularly between the words, like he doesn’t have the ability to stop, even to breathe.

“Shh. It’s okay, you’re okay, you’re okay,” Martin lies, speaking over the words of strangers spilling from Jon’s mouth.

Jon’s only answer is to fold himself even smaller in Martin’s lap, statements still pouring forth, breath warm and tears damp against his chest. Martin holds him tighter, like it will stop him from falling apart.

“We’ll be alright,” he says, to keep himself from crying too. “We’ll think of something.”

Martin doesn’t think glass is the only thing that shattered when the world ended.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


	3. torn pages

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon loses himself in Seeing. Martin gives up some of himself to bring him back.
> 
>  **Warnings:** implied internalized homophobia or acephobia, description of a panic attack
> 
> Spoilers up through ep 160

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah geez ah yikes I wanted to get this out b4 the trailer dropped but whoops here we are. At least listening first allowed me to make some minor edits to keep this more in-line with canon and characterization so that’s good. Also, hot damn. I was not ready to feel that many emotions in the span of 3 minutes.

Martin wakes up disorientated, cold, and distressingly alone.

“Jon?” he whispers into the dark. Only muffled noises of the chaos outside answer.

Along with various weapons and other supplies, Daisy had amassed a stash of emergency glowsticks. Useful for saving precious batteries. Martin cracked one before they went to bed to keep the darkness marginally at bay while they slept.

As he gets his bearings, his eyes gradually adjust to its sickly green glow. He can just make out the familiar shapes of the bedroom in the safehouse. Chest of drawers. Floor lamp, now useless. Boarded-up window. There’s no sign of Jon, and his side of the bed has gone cold. Taking a deep breath to quell his panic, Martin shoves away the covers and struggles to his feet. His body protests, sore from running and tension and fear.

Jon isn’t in the front room either. The door is wide open, and the new, unnatural night pours into their house, loud and terrible. His stomach turns over. He realizes might need a weapon, so on his way out he grabs the umbrella resting by the door, for all the good it will do. He forgoes shoes and a jacket in favour of speed. He doesn’t have to go far. Relief leaves him weak-kneed, and the umbrella falls from his fingers. Jon is out in the garden, standing stock-still. He’s looking up at what used to be the sky.

Martin hurries over to him, dead grass crumbling under his feet with each step.

“Jon?” asks Martin. “Are you alright?”

Jon doesn’t answer. There’s a wild half-grin on his face, and his eyes. _God_ , his eyes.

“Right. Back to bed with you.”

It’s cold and monster-ey out, so regardless of eye powers Jon shouldn’t be outside in pants and a t-shirt. Martin takes his shoulders and tries to manoeuvre him towards the house, but he won’t budge. His gaze is directed to the eyes above, but Martin has the impression he’s truly Looking elsewhere.

Martin takes Jon’s face in both his hands and looks directly into his eyes.

“Jon. Look at me.”

Something that both is and isn’t Jon looks back and

_His f_ _irst kiss is in year nine. It’s the feeling of her lips against his, and the taste of her last cigarette, which she stole from her mother’s purse, and a cold pit in his stomach. He cries when he gets home, and he knows why, but he doesn’t want to know—_

and

_He had liked the idea of being the only one awake, and they didn’t ask for references or even an ID. He thought he would feel safe and at peace sweeping up the dirt of the day, making the whole building look nice for tomorrow. Plus, there’s no chance of running into anyone he knows, since he works alone. But as it turns out, being the only one awake digs the pit in his stomach even deeper, and he has to constantly resist the urge to look out windows. If he looks, he’ll sometimes see into someone’s flat and see them sitting up alone in a little patch of light in the dark. Or he’ll see a person walking alone down the street, weaving in and out of the bright pools of the streetlamps. He can’t help but wonder if they feel the same nightly aching emptiness that he does, and it makes him hurt too much to contend with—_

and

_His mother doesn’t talk to him anymore if she can help it. She endures his care in stony silence. At first, he wonders if she’s having memory issues or something, but he hears her on the phone with other people and she’s animated and sharp—_

and

_Journal of Martin Blackwood_

_Thursday 16 th June 2016_

_Sometimes when I hold a hot cup of tea, my tired hands mistake the heat of the kettle for the warmth of companionship. Company is what I crave, and yet, when I'm around those who should warm me the most, I feel cold. My ~~mind~~ body bids me to flee from caress and kiss and hug and punch and shove alike. My aching soul never learned to tell the difference between a touch meant for me, and a touch ~~meant for you~~ that only meant you needed to grab hold of something. I long so deeply for anyone to hold me, and yet, ~~I am afrai~~ when the occasion arises, I am afraid to be so close they might feel the cold inside of me seeping out and into them. For now, I will settle for the closest thing I have found to the fabled warmth I cannot reach. Another cup of tea—_

and

_He’s standing in the breakroom, holding a mug with some nondescript charity logo on it, deciding if he should bother making tea. It’s a habit to make tea on his break, but it seems ridiculous to boil a whole kettle for just one cup, and he doesn’t know many people here anymore, and it’s not like Peter will be around to drink tea, and Jon is in a coma and Tim is dead and Sasha is dead and it’s not like Peter will be around to drink tea and Jon is in a coma and Tim is dead and Sasha is dead and he can’t move and Jon is in a coma and Tim is dead and Sasha is dead and he can’t breathe and it’s all too much and there’s a cold gaping hole opening in his core to swallow him whole and he can’t move and he can’t breathe—_

and Jon

_He’s looking in at Jon in his office. Jon scribbles notes on a pad of paper, glancing between his laptop screen and the page, while Martin lurks in the doorway, unperceived. Jon pauses and glances up at the doorway, then does a double take. He squints and cranes his neck to the side, looking, but not Looking. Martin hopes for a second, then berates himself for it._

_“Hello?” he asks. “Daisy?”_

_Eventually, Jon shakes his head and mutters “Perfect. I’m finally losing it.”_

_Jon goes back to his papers._

_Martin goes back to Peter—_

and Jon

_He drifts in the shifting fog of the Lonely until Jon sees him, and he follows the feeling of being Known. He follows it home. He would follow Jon anywhere, he thinks, even to the end of the world—_

and Jon

_He’s lying in bed in the safehouse, on his back, making pictures from cracks in the ceiling. It’s early morning. Light filters through the curtains. He should feel happy. He sneaks a peek at Jon and he’s still asleep, the crease between his eyebrows barely visible. Martin goes back to ceiling-gazing, letting himself soak in the haze of melancholy he knows he should have left behind already._

_He startles when Jon takes his hand and softly kisses his knuckles._

_“Good morning,” Jon says, his voice rough with sleep. Martin’s heart does something in his chest it hasn’t done for a long time._

_“Hi,” he says, in more of a squeak than he means to._

_“I like waking up to your face,” says Jon._

_Martin genuinely squeaks at that and hides under the covers. He can hear Jon chuckling outside his blanket cocoon and oh._ This _is joy. The melancholy still clings to him, but he can barely feel it, under this. This is joy. This is joy._

and Jon needs

_He’s lying in bed in the safehouse, curled around the warmth that is Jon._ _He kisses the top of Jon’s head, and Jon wriggles around to face him and kisses his knuckles._

_“What are you thinking about?” murmurs Jon, no compulsion behind it, just plain human curiosity._

_“Just you,” he answers, “And how I would follow you anywhere. Even to the end of the world.”_

_“That’s rather melodramatic,” says Jon with a grimace. “But I’ll allow it. Seeing as you’re a poet.”_

_“You asked!”_

_“I’m teasing. You know I’d do the same.” He sounds so earnest it makes Martin’s chest ache._

_“You already have done.”_

_“Hm. I suppose so. I’d do it again, then. As many times as you needed.”_

and Jon needs him.

“Jon. I need you to follow me. Please, come home.” The words come out hoarse. He can taste tears on his lips.

And it seems like Jon does follow. Some of the otherness in his gaze eases back, and _Jon’s_ eyes, the familiar brown earthly ones, settle on Martin.

“Hey there—” says Martin.

At the same time, Jon says, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—”

There’s a deep crunching sound from a copse of trees a small distance away, then an uncanny wailing starts up.

“We can do this inside, come on.” Martin puts an arm around Jon’s shoulders, and this time he does concede to being led back to the house. The whole way he looks ready to be reprimanded. Or told to go.

“Are you okay?” asks Jon, as soon as the door is bolted behind them.

“I’m fine, really.” Martin’s mind feels torn, like the pages of his memories weren’t meant to be handled in that way. It’s fine. He’s fine.

“You don’t have to lie to me. I Know what it felt like for you.”

“And I know you didn’t mean to, it’s really okay. I’m more worried about you. What happened?”

“I Saw too much,” Jon says dully. “And I will continue to See too much. There’s nothing I can do about it. I might as well…adjust.”

“Let’s go back to bed, yeah? We’ll both feel better in the morning.”

Jon doesn’t look convinced. They go to bed anyway. Jon lies on his side, facing away from Martin, curled into a tight ball. Martin cautiously drapes one arm over him. Jon doesn’t respond at first, and Martin prepares to be shrugged off. Then Jon rolls over and tucks himself into place under his chin.

““We don’t even know if it’s still night,” says Jon.

“Are you tired?”

“Yes.”

“Then it’s night.”

“I think it’s going to be night for a very long time.”

“Just go to sleep, Jon.”

Eventually, Martin feels him relax, feels his breathing shift to the uneven rhythm of someone dreaming deeply. Martin stares into the dark for a long time after, repeating to himself that morning will come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Take care everyone <3


	4. Announcement

Chapter 4 exists! But it does not exist here! [It lives at part 2 of what is now a series.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25806292) I just wanted to let anyone subscribed to this know that I've added it, and will no longer be adding chapters to this one work. They will instead be their own fics, but connected as parts of the series.

(Also sorry if you saw this announcement a few weeks ago, I added a fic to the series then realized it needed some work, so I took it down. That fic will be back up soon, and better than ever.)


End file.
